please empty your brain below
The reason for this? There are not enough houses? Building flats for the rich illeviates this problem. It doesn't make it worse.
There are only two ways out of the housing crisis in London. That people leave (which Brexit killing the City might trigger) or we build.
Second, younger generations may not have the same issues either, the desperation to move out to the suburbs isn't there like it was, my neighbors son has bought a flat in Finsbury Park, to the utter bafflement of his parents.
London's housing problems have little to do with provision of luxury housing developments. We need far more housing of all types and we should have policies in place to deliver that. Large scale social housing building whether provided by local government or housing associations should be provided. At present the requirements on private developers to include "affordable" housing in their developments are bizarre. We dont require Rolls Royce to also produce a small family runaround or Selfridges to sell at least 20% of their offering at below £1 so why do we impose such constraints on housing developers.
Yes we should have mixed housing but there are other ways of delivering it than the present system that doesnt work.
Lets encourage more homes of all types to be built - only then will we halt the present ridiculous spiraling prices
A few miles north of Bow a football club is building, beside its new stadium, an effectively 35-storey tower of similar exclusive apartments. That is putting extra pressure on a week-willed Council leadership to demolish the whole adjacent area, replacing social housing at best with what is considered affordable - 80% of superheated market rent.
I rented a flat in Halo Tower, which at barely four years old was already requiring significant internal and external repairs. The owner had three flats in the same building - I work in central London but can't even get myself a mortgage on a studio apartment! Not that I think I'd want one in a development like this.
http://londonplanninganalyst.com/2016/06/23/galliard-pleads-poverty-in-stratford
"Along with the application they also supplied the names and addresses of all those who had bought a flat. Needless to say 90% + were from Asia."
One could argue therefore that any social housing obligation should be provided onsite not elsewhere in the borough.
Logically this argument could apply to all sites, even the most expensive, such as One Hyde Park. Much of the value there was surely provided by those who built Hyde Park (or Harrods or whatever).
If the inclusion of social housing lowers the price achievable by developers for the other units in oversees sales this could be seen as a good thing if we agree that housing is too expensive.
Also the cladding around the car park looks VERY different to original architect's pictures.
http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=1684673
Those images show them in a lovely shimmering gold rather than the dull brown (also notice the original images conveniently erase the flyover).
Well if you take a look at what else is going up around Stratford High St and the Olympic Park, and what is in the pipelimne, it is very much becoming the norm.
Isn't the planning authority the LLDC and not Newham Council?
1. Local Governemnt should be allowed to borrow money to build houses and infrastructure. By local, I mean mayor's office, rather than impoverished london borough councils which can too easily be swayed by the promise of developer's cash. I do not begrudge the building of luxury apartments like this if they do not force other residents out but they would not create such an issue if social housing could be provided on the scales it has been in the past.
2. A Concierge - this is something that should be a feature of more apartments and not just luxury blocks. This happens in other countries and makes for a safer environment, and also a visible, accountable presence for when things go wrong. When I lived in a (horrible shoddy) new build flat the management company and its many outsourced arms were impossible to get hold of and it was unclear where responsiblity lay. Having a person on the estate responsible for this would have made this better and we really should encourage that somehow by incentivising developers to provide this.
But Rolls Royce isn't the only supplier of cars, and Selfridges isn't the only available retail offering.
As far as I'm aware there isn't a budget supplier of housing in London, I can only buy or rent property in London at Rolls Royce/Selfridges prices, you need to be very lucky to get a council or social housing property.
The other issue is that we have had very low interest rates for around 10 years, more and more have six figure mortgages (and parents extending their mortgages for their children), as a result even small increases in interest will produce massive bills.
But DG could be right in that customers for the posh flats are not actually releasing any other property, because if the posh flats were not built they would, instead, stay elswhere (Frankfurt, say), and not bother the UK housing market at all.
Leaving all that aside, it is very interesting (to me) to have this reported. The Bow roundabout (though I do not go there often) is a symbol, perhaps, for the whole of London.
dg writes: I was walking to Stratford, and then I walked back.
Very often they're crap.
I deliver on-line shopping throughout south-east London and see inside the buildings all the time. Some are in need of renovation already and they're only 3-4 years old.
One new block I know of has serious damp problems. Talking with one customer in a big development in Greenwich yesterday he showed me a letter which stated the cladding of the building is -- you've guessed it -- of Grenfell Tower standard and has to be replaced....
There are many other examples everywhere.
I'm not saying every block is shoddily built, but it will be interesting to see the state of many of them -- and their value -- in 10 years time.
The latest "luxury apartments" going up by the station were promised to be for local people, but have been snapped up by overseas investors, with just one being bought by someone locally.
We shouldn't have been surprised that it was probably the plan all along, when the offices opposite the bus garage that offered 'help back to work' type courses closed and a marketing suite for the development moved in instead!
My experience with new builds, especially apartments, is that very often they are crap as you suggest.
The mould will be down to very poor ventilation, a consequence of the property needing to be well insulated. I developed asthma in my new build due to the constant mould and condensation. You couldn't open the windows - as it was a ground floor flat. You can't heat these places economically as very often they are electric only (no gas), so your only option is an electric ventialation system, and guess what - no developer installs these as standard.
The quality of the fixtures and fittings and the workmanship where I used to live was embarassing, and this was built as a luxury block. It's put me off new-build apartments completely.
TLDR: New build flats are crap and expensive
Also I agree with DG. These types of development have NO benefits for London. They drive up land values making it impossible to build affordable homes. They should be heavily taxed.
However, 52% of us may have stumbled on the only way to damp down this demand - just make England less attractive. Tough on all those who live here, and enjoy it. But that's the free market for you!
Actually two fugly buildings.
Even in the photos one can sense that they are going to look like c**p after a few years. They add nothing and take everything they can get away with.
What is the prevailing wisdom viz a Brexit-induced property slump in London? Are these overseas speculators going to get seriously messed up with their 'investments'?
I can take you to at least 10 different blocks that originally had concierges but now don't.
I suspect it's a sort of lure and that once the flats are fully bought up then the concierge is dropped.
If the purchasers are buy to let 'investors' then they won't care too much.
I would add that quite a few council blocks I deliver to also had concierges/caretakers once. The locked and shuttered up offices are strangely poignant and to me herald a real loss to the communities they once served.
Here's an account of taking a client to the newly regenerated Woodberry Downs estate in Manor Park: "When it was finished, I drove her from Heathrow to have a look. As we got closer, the surroundings got rougher and rougher, she went quieter and quieter, and when we arrived she said: ‘I can’t stay here. Put me in a hotel.’ And the next morning she wanted to sell up - immediately."
Not exactly but car makers have been subject to requirements such as fuel consumption /based on their total output/.
I understand that one year General Motors had to sell 1000 additional electric cars to meet their target
Also - Isn't it a bit coincidental that Capital towers, Hudson tower, icona point, aurora building, halo, (there's actually more!) were all designed by Stock Woolstencroft Architects? And - how did Stock Woolstencroft Architects managed to obtain further planning permission for significantly taller buildings than originally planned - many of their buildings have have numerous floors added. I smell a rat..
2. Ban foreigners buying property in this country.
3. Over time, have housing associations acquire anything currently owned under 1 and 2, and re-let it as social housing, but only on short-term contracts (social housing should not be allocated for life, but only for as long as a pre-defined need - eg low level of income - exists).
Housing problem almost solved.
Let's not paint foreigners with the same brush.
As foreign investors won't have had their money in GBP originally, they won't really lose anything from the currency adjusting to its new level. GBP will rise again in the next 20 years. It's been much higher and lower before.
The point is to spread their risk and maintain the value of their money. Unlike British people who get excited every time their property nominally rises in value, foreign investors don't care too much about making a profit on their property, as long as they get their money back (in terms of euros or USD) although they do want the income from renting it out.
TridentScan | Privacy Policy